Finding Natalie
by ghilliekitten
Summary: Zack and Cody have a secret. How long can they keep it from Moseby?
1. Chapter 1

AN - I was kinda bored, and this idea just sort of came to me …

Disclaimer - I don't own it, allright!

School was finally over for the summer, and Zack and Cody were walking home from school, just like it was a normal day. They were both lost in thought about the summer ahead. They were wondering if they were going to spend the summer with their dad, or, maybe, at the Tipton, with their mom. It always varied, and it was fun to keep guessing. The twins were so lost in their thoughts, however, that they almost didn't hear the small noise coming from behind the dumpster.

"Meow"

"Did you hear that Zack?"

"No …"

"Meow"

"allright, now I did. What now?"

"We go and investigate?

"okay" And so, the twins crept quietly and peered behind the dumpster. Expecting to see a full grown cat ( probably one that had just found a bird or mouse just out of reach) they were surprised to find a small kitten, looking lost, just sitting there, meowing for no apparent reason.

"Wow!" Zack whispered " what do you say we catch it and take it home?"

"Moseby would never let us keep it, and you know it!"

"Moseby doesn't need to know. We can keep it hidden in our room - maybe just until we find a home for it …"

" your right …. We can't just leave it out here on it's own … look how thin it is - it would starve to death! Even if Moseby finds out and makes us get rid of it, we can always take it to the pound, and someone will adopt it …" With that, they crouched down, and moved in slowly closer to the kitten. The kitten hissed, spat, and backed away, feeling scared.

" Don't we have anything to lure it with? Some food, or something?"

"Yeah … here's my leftover milk from lunch … that might work … but we need something to put it in …"

" How about the lid to my pencil sharpener?

"That might work." Cody put some of the milk into the pencil sharpener lid, and put it down on the ground, closer to the frightened kitten. The kitten smelled the offering, and, being nhungry, stepped forward cautiously.

WHAM! A big tomcat landed on the dumpster and leaped off, walking over to the milk.

"NO! that's NOT your milk!" When Cody and Zack had chased the tomcat away, they found that the kitten had moved up and was now drinking the milk. It didn't even seem afraid when Cody put more milk in the pencil sharpener lid.

Three pencil sharpener lids full later, Cody was able to pick up the kitten.

" We need somewhere for it to hide when we get into the Tipton …" Zack was commenting.

"Yeah … but where? It's not like we could use our backpacks …"

"Wait a minute, we could put it in our backpacks - we still have our gym clothes, and we could make kind of a bed …"

"hmm… that might work …" and so they did. The kitten was finally asleep, when they walked through the doors of the Tipton. Moseby was busy with a guest, and so he didn't notice or suspect anything. Neither did anyone else, because Zack and Cody were able to get into the room without the kitten being found.

"Okay" said Cody, after the kitten had gotten settled " what are we going to name her?"

"are you sure it's a her?"

"Yes"

"Let's name her Keira, after Keira Knightley!"

"Nah, let's name her Natalie, after Natalie Portman!"

"Keira!"

"Natalie!"

"Boys, I'm trying to practice! If you can't keep it down in there, I ma have to come see what your arguing about!

"We can't let Mom know!"

"No … how about a coin toss?" said Zack, pulling out a quarter

"Okay. Heads I pick, tails you pick."

"Fair enough … heads! Darn!"

" okay… I pick …. Natalie."

AN - well, hopefully this was okay … If it needs improvement, please let me know. Of course, if it's okay, and you like it, feel free to let me know that, too (smiles)


	2. Chapter 2

AN - well, here's chapter two … sorry it took so long …

Disclaimer - I don't own it! And you won't get anywhere by pretending that I do!

Dedication - this chapter is dedicated to Siri and Charlie

Thanks SO MUCH to all my awesome reviewers! YAY!

Zippy - Wings - yeah, yeah … I'm not looking at you. Is this chappie any better?

glowing - ice - thanks for the review … you weren't introduced to The Suite Life?

liteswitch - again, is this chappie better? And yes, I have the whole series planned out …

Chihuahuaauthor99 - yes, they did put Natalie in Cody's backpack, so no worries

sandylover - thanks so much J I love kitties too

Now, obvious complications can come up with keeping a kitten in a hotel … especially when the owners of said kitten aren't allowed to have any pets other than pet rocks. Fortunately, kittens are easier to hide than horses, and they are easier to keep in a bedroom than a horse. Natalie didn't escape from the bedroom. That meant, however, that she spent the whole night jumping from Zack's bed to Cody's bed, back and forth all night, so Zack and Cody didn't get much sleep, and were sleeping when their mom knocked on their door at 9 am.

"Zack! Cody! It's breakfast time … "

"Allright, Mom, we're up …" fifteen minutes later, they sat down to breakfast.

"Okay, what's up? You two never sleep late on summer vacation. I would have expected you up at six. Why get up so late?

"Well, we didn't get a lot of sleep last night …" Zack commented

"Why?"

"Well, because we …" Cody kicked Zack under the table. Somehow Zack didn't make a sound, but he looked at Cody, who gave him a glare, and Zack realized what was wrong.

" Well, we were wondering where we were going to spend the summer"

"Mostly with me, but your dad's coming in a few weeks to take you on vacation for a week or so." Zack and Cody just nodded.

"Any idea where?" asked Cody

"No. That's between you and you dad. Now, I've got to go to rehearsal for a few hours, so I'll be singing right downstairs, if you need anything.

"Thanks Mom,"

"See you later"

After their mom left, Zack and Cody could finally open the door to their room, and sure enough, out streaked a little grey furball. After a few minutes, Natalie came up to Cody, and meowed, wanting to be held.

"She sure is cute" Zack commented, when Cody picked her up "And she's probably hungry. Shall I get out some cheese?"

"No … she needs proper cat food. She'll need a litterbox, too" Cody paused a moment. "She'll probably want cat toys, and … she'll need a bath."

"Slight problem." Zack interrupted. "How do you propose to pay for everything? Cat toys, cat food, a litterbox, not to mention litter, probably a cat bed, AND pet shampoo! That's going to cost a lot of money, and I only have ten dollars from my allowance!"

"I have twenty bucks that I saved from walking London's dog Yevanna (AN - is this spelled right? Please correct me if it's not …) And we don't have to buy all of it … Let's just get a box, cut off the top and put some sand in it? That can be a good litterbox, and we won't have to work about taking out the litter - we can just dump it outside and it won't be polluting! And we can find stuff to use for cat toys … and the bed … well, we can find something to use. That only leaves the cat food and the pet shampoo. We can handle that with thirty dollars."

"Okay, but what about shots?"

"Never liked them"

"No, I mean for Natalie!"

" um … we can save our money again?"

"Okay …" and so Zack and Cody put Natalie in their room, where Natalie decided she'd like to have a pillow for a kitty bed - Cody's pillow. Since she really seemed to like her "bed" Cody decided that he could share his pillow. So, Zack and Cody went out and found everything they needed. Getting into the Tipton with a litterbox, cat food and pet shampoo was a bit of a challenge, but Zack made a big distraction while Cody ran upstairs with said kitty supplies.

The next order of business was to give Natalie a bath. That was not that easy, but Natalie did need a bath. Cody put up the shower curtain so that Natalie wouldn't try to climb it while Zack ran some warm water in the tub. Natalie meowed very loudly in protest, but there was really no help at all for it after Natalie attempted at least five times to escape her bath, she was finally clean.

"We need to get her used to baths" Zack said, holding Natalie (in a towel) over to Cody.

"Maybe. She's just a kitten, so she can probably learn to at least tolerate baths."

"Yeah, and it will keep the cat hair down so that Mom doesn't need to know we have Natalie … after the incident with Tippy, I don't think Mom would be very happy if she found out that we brought home another pet."

"Yeah … poor thing, she's shivering!"

"She'll dry off." And sure enough, Natalie started to groom herself, and was soon dry, and feeling very playful, so Zack and Cody were taking turns playing with her using an old sock.

"Does she EVER run out of energy?" asked Zack, an hour later

"Apparently not … well, not very quickly, at least"

Just then, there came a knock on the door

"Zack, Cody, are you two in there?"

AN - hope you liked it … sorry it took so long to update … please review!


	3. Chapter 3

_A.N. Sorry it took me forever to update and leaving you all with a cliffie … my muse just decided to take a break from this story for a while, but now it's back!_

"Zack, Cody, are you two in there?"

"Uh Oh! It's Maddie! Quick, hide the kitten in our room!

As Zack ran to answer the door, Cody ran to hide Natalie in their bedroom

"How're you doin' sweet thang?"

"Zack, will you PLEASE stop calling me that? Your mom was really worried about you two, and she asked me to come up here when I had a minute to make sure you two are alright."

"I'd be better if I had a kiss from you, sweet thang."

"Oh, man, I hope she doesn't realize that I'm just stalling here, even though I wouldn't say no to a kiss … where is Cody? He was supposed to be back … how long does it take to put a kitten in our bedroom anyway? Apparently a lot longer than I thought it would … I guess it would take him a lot longer than it would take me. I just hope he's happy, because if…"

"Um, Zack, are you sure you're okay? And, where's Cody?

"I'm fine, as for Cody, um … do you want me to go find him?"

"Sure, and just for security purposes, I want the both of you to come out together, so I know that it's really both of you, and not you masquerading as him, okay?"

"_Well, I hope he's happy, because if Maddie finds out about Natalie, then we're going to be in BIG trouble! _

Zack ran into their bedroom, and sure enough, there was Cody, holding Natalie, hiding behind a bed

"Cody, the point was that you would hide Natalie, then come out of the bedroom, not hiding WITH Natalie. Come on, I think Maddie may be on to us … at the very least she suspects something."

"allright, allright, I'm going!" Cody put a small piece of cheese on the floor to distract Natalie while he and Zack left the room

After Maddie left, Zack and Cody let Maddie out of their room.

"That was close"

"ya think! We have to be more careful than that! But how?" Cody looked around for Natalie, who was crouched behind a shoe, trying to hunt something that Zack and Cody couldn't see.

"Maybe she just needs to run off some energy … maybe we could take her to the park.

"Wouldn't she just run off?"

"I don't think so, not if we kept a close eye on her anyhow."

"Okay, to the park it is … wait a minute – the park we usually play in is across the street! If we go there, Moseby or somebody will see us."

" No, they won't. Not if we go to the park a couple of blocks over.

" Okay, if you say so." Cody picked up Natalie, who protested loudly at being held. Deciding that they had very little chance of actually getting downstairs without Moseby catching them, and that the best way to get Natalie to be quiet was to put her down, Zack and Cody decided to not go to the park. Once that was decided, it was pretty fun playing with the kitten. Natalie had a toy that she particularly loved, and she could amuse herself for hours playing at hunting it.

The telephone rang, and Cody took over playing with Natalie while Zack answered

"Hello?"

"Hello, um … is this Zack or Cody?"

"Zack"

"Cool … this is Tapeworm. Listen, Max and I were going to get together to play some basketball in about half an hour. You and Cody want to come too?

"That sounds awesome!"

"So you and Cody will be there?"

"Absolutely!"

"See you then! And he hung up, turned around and told his brother what was going on.

" Well, as you could probably guess, that was Tapeworm…"

"And"

" Well, he wants up to come to play some basketball in half an hour…"

"And you said we would be there?"

"Yes."

"What about Natalie?"

"What about her?"

"We can't take her to play basketball, we can't even get her out of the suite without being caught! What are we going to do?"

"Leave her here?"

"No! Anyway, not alone, she'd be miserable! She's just a baby kitten, and she needs someone to give her attention and keep her out of trouble" Cody thought a minute, and then continued. "But, basketball really isn't my thing. I can stay here with Natalie today, and then you can stay here next time."

"Fair enough"

And so Zack left to go play basketball, and Cody was in the suite, hoping that Natalie would still be in a playful mood.

But Natalie wasn't feeling playful. She meowed insistently at the door to the twins' bedroom. Cody didn't really know exactly what she meant. So she meowed again.

"Sorry" he told her "you can't go out. Moseby will catch us, and then I'll be in big trouble and you'll be back out in the big world again." Natalie apparently wasn't that great a listener, and meowed yet again! When this didn't get any response, she jumped up on to Cody's bed, but found that it was made, and not to her liking. When she jumped onto Zack's bed, however, she found that it wasn't made, and …

"Natalie, what are you doing?" Cody asked " because if you're…" he picked her up, and sure enough, she was.

"Natalie! What did you do that for! He said, a little ticked off at her, but thinking that it was probably his fault anyhow for not letting her out of the bedroom. Now you're going to get me into trouble with Mom, and then with Moseby … unless … a solution to the dilemma was already presenting itself. He would just have to see in the laundry room was not being used … knowing Muriel, he didn't suspect it would be …

So, after putting Natalie in the bathroom (with her litterbox) he gathered up the dirty sheets, and proceeded to the laundry room. Actually doing the laundry went, for the most part, without any major incidents, and he had folded the sheets (as best he could) and was heading back up to their suite, when he accidentally bumped into London.

"Hi Cody."

"Hi London" suddenly trying not to drop the sheets was getting harder …

"What's with the sheets?" hopeing she wasn't really on to what he was doing, he decided that his best bet was to make up a quick lie.

" Zack and I were hanging out in our room, and I accidentally spilled soda, so I told him I'd clean up – and I did."

"Oh."

He then bowed out of the conversation with London, and proceeded up to the 23rd floor, to their suite, and the bedroom.

Zack was apparently still playing basketball with Max and Tapeworm, so he decided that his best bet was to make the bed.

After that was done, he decided to show Natalie that he wasn't mad at her anymore, and played with her, using her favorite toy.

Later that night, Zack and Cody were staying up, just because they could, talking about much of nothing. Cody was petting Natalie, when she began to make funny noises that sounded weird – something between the sound a chipmunk makes and an unvoiced meow.

"aw, look, she's dreaming"

_A/N – well, I hope it wasn't too weird or random … but please do tell me what you think … remember, getting reviews means that I write faster!_


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